Meet the bar: The Wild Yarrow

Delicious Sushi & McQueen Gin Tasting Platter

A new Gem in South bridge, Edinburgh

The Wild Yarrow is a newly-established wonderful bar and bistro located in South Bridge in Edinburgh. Owned and managed by Mert Azdemir, their aim is to use unique and delicious beverages and great tasting food as their secret to making life just that little bit better – a simple but effective concept that we can most definitely get behind!

We’re absolutely delighted to be working with Mert and the rest of the team so closely as their core gin partner for the Wild Yarrow. Mert’s ambitions and outlook match ours – trying to provide something a little bit different and exciting that visitors can really love and feel a part of. With an interesting and diverse menu accompanied by a great range of gin and much more, we spoke to Mert to find out more about this new gem and much more!

Introduce us to the Wild Yarrow, what can customers expect?

‘’Our aim is simple, but so important. We aim to provide people with high quality food and drinks accompanied by a relaxed atmosphere where anyone can feel comfortable and at-ease in our establishment. We hope to communicate directly with our customers to give them a real ‘human’ experience. We want our customers to feel appreciated and acknowledged and hope to learn more about their food and drink preferences in order to continuously make what we can offer more extensive and inclusive for everyone who might stop by. We are striving to really get to know our customers so that we can make suggestions and adaptations to the menu and drinks list that are sincere and unique to our customers. I also wish to express my passion for mixology and the pride and gratification gained from putting that to use in The Wild Yarrow. I love creating cocktails and drinks options that are unique and exciting, giving the customers something to get excited about!’’

What are your plans for the Wild Yarrow?

‘’We are very ambitious. Our plans for the future are to become one of the best-known and most popular bars in Edinburgh – if not the best. Aside from the ambitions for success, we are also passionate about promoting truly quality drinks in our bar and providing a platform for new drinks/brands to get some recognition. We will always strive to identify the very best new drinks available and help them where we can.’’

When thinking about what to stock, what do you look for?

‘’Although committed to providing new drinks and brands with some opportunity, we of course also look to stock food and drinks that are popular within the market. We think it is important to have the correct balance of new and exciting products alongside established, more well-known products. The most important thing though, is quality. Overall, we look for great quality drinks and raw materials and ingredients that our customers will love.’’

What is it you love about McQueen Gin?

‘’We loved the fact that the ingredients used in McQueen Gin’s products are locally sourced, and of course the taste is amazing too! The unique and exciting product range is perfect for our bar and why we were so keen to stock the gins. Additionally, we visited the home of McQueen Gin at the Trossachs Distillery in Callander and met Mr Dale McQueen himself which helped us make our decision. Dale’s knowledge and passion showed us exactly how great the McQueen products are and played a huge part in our decision. The McQueen range has proved very popular, with the Mocha gin in particular being a favourite with our customers – they say it tastes amazing.’’

Who would be your three dream customers to the Wild Yarrow?

‘’The first person I’d love to see in the bar is my mum. She lives in Turkey and I would love to let her see how hard I have worked to establish the Wild Yarrow, I’m sure she’d be very proud. I’d also love to have Marco Pierre White into the Wild Yarrow. I love his story of how he started from the very bottom and worked his way up to become one of the best chefs in the world today. The third would be Denzel Washington, mainly because he is my favourite actor! I think it’d be very cool for him to be having a quiet McQueen Gin in the bar at the Wild Yarrow!’’